Catholics Celebrate Day of the Virgin : Culture: Area Latinos crowd churches for Masses honoring Mexico’s patron saint. She is revered as the protector of the downtrodden.

Santa Paula resident Bob Borrego joined thousands of Latino Roman Catholics throughout the county who awoke before dawn Monday to attend crowded church services in observance of the patron saint of Mexico.

They gathered in churches, restaurants and homes during the daylong celebration of El Dia de la Virgen Guadalupe--The Day of Our Lady of Guadalupe. They ate the traditional tamales, drank canela, listened to mariachi bands, sang and prayed as millions of Catholics throughout the Americas do each year at this time.

It is one of the biggest religious celebrations of the year for those of Latino descent, who believe the Virgin Mary appeared as a native woman on Dec. 12, 1531, in Mexico.

“This is an important day for us,” Borrego said. “She’s the patron saint of the Mexican people.”

Borrego has spent the last few weeks helping organize his church’s Guadalupe celebration, which was supposed to culminate with a 15-block procession through Santa Paula on Monday evening. But rain and a lower-than-expected turnout forced the church to dramatically shorten the parade.

“It doesn’t matter,” said Sandra Cancino as she held her 7-month-old son, Julio, who was dressed in a traditional pancho and straw hat. “It’s still her day.”

Cancino and her family planned to attend the evening service at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, which was simultaneously observing its 55th anniversary. More than 300 parishioners overflowed the tiny church for morning Mass, Juarez said.

In Ventura, San Buenaventura Mission had pre-dawn and evening Masses, as well. “This is a significant event,” agreed mission Father Joseph Pina.

In Oxnard, a Mexican grocery store unveiled its redone altar to the Virgin Mary as dozens of customers took turns praying in front of the monument, commissioned by La Gloria de Oxnard owner Rosa Alcala. Alcala proudly showed off the intricate four-foot image of Mary set against a mural of angels and attached to the brick wall outside.

Rita Diaz and her three sons drove from Newbury Park to the grocery store to view the shrine, which the Alcalas had previously displayed over their meat counter.

“I am praying for her to protect my family,” Diaz said.

Latin Americans revere the Lady of Guadalupe as the protector of the downtrodden and oppressed, Pina said.

And Dec. 12 is significant to the Latino community because it represents the start of Roman Catholicism’s popularity in Mexico, Pina said.

Pina said the day celebrates the apparition of the Virgin Mary witnessed by Juan Diego in 1531. The sighting helped heal the animosity between the conquering Catholic Spaniards and the indigenous Mexicans, who resisted conversion, Pina said.

“Before the apparition, the Spanish managed to baptize only a few hundred indigenous,” Pina said. ‘Afterward, millions of baptisms occurred.”

Tradition holds that the apparition first appeared to Juan Diego, a 50-year-old Indian peasant, on Dec. 9 on a hill at Tepeyac, northwest of Mexico City. She told him to contact the bishop and have a church built on the site.

The bishop doubted the story. Three days later, the Virgin caused rose bushes to bloom and had Juan Diego present the flowers to the bishop as proof. The roses gathered in his mantel fell to the ground and revealed the image of a brown-skinned Virgin in the cloth.

The Basilica of the Lady of Guadalupe is now at the site. The icon used to lead Santa Paula’s procession was sent from the Basilica, Juarez said.

“She healed the rift between the indigenous Mexicans and the Spaniards,” Pina said.